What is your teaching philosophy?

To help people help themselves, and for them to reach a point where they are the ones comfortable teaching me.

What might you do in a typical first session with a student?

Take a detailed learning style assessment, write a sample paper, hold a discussion, and formulate the goals we wish to accomplish.

How can you help a student become an independent learner?

I do not give answers. I ask the questions that are needed. Most of the time, the student already knows the answer given the proper guidance, and as a result becomes empowered with the confidence to take on any problems with a solution mindset immediately as they come along.

How would you help a student stay motivated?

Motivation comes with passion, passion is derived from interest, and interest is grown from curiosity. Curiosity is founded on asking the questions that promote self-discovery and personal insight.

How do you help students who are struggling with reading comprehension?

Any body of text can be broken down to components that can be intuitively understood. Each paragraph holds a "gist," which condenses into a few words in a margin. If you can't explain it simply, you do not understand it. These "gists" interact and combine with one another to create systems and complex ideas. The idea is to start from the bottom up.

What strategies have you found to be most successful when you start to work with a student?

Be able to start a back and forth discussion of who they are and what drives their curiosity.

How would you help a student get excited/engaged with a subject that they are struggling in?

Using metaphors is a powerful tool to transform complex and nuanced ideas into everyday experiences. We are comfortable to work and process what we are familiar with.

What techniques would you use to be sure that a student understands the material?

The priority would be to have them be able to teach me the concept at every angle and possibility, at a level where we can have thoughtful discourse on ideas that have never been thought before.

How do you build a student's confidence in a subject?

Confidence comes from being able to be one's own leader, to feel empowered from being able to answer our own questions, without being dependent on others. The independent thinker is open to both changing their mind and challenging others' ideas; there's a sense of security that comes with this.

How do you evaluate a student's needs?

By seeing where their confidence is lacking; this shows in the questions they have to ask me, with the expectation to get an immediate answer. Wherever their sense of independence is lacking, which is revealed through the tutee teaching the student as well.

How do you adapt your tutoring to the student's needs?

I ask the questions that are most pertinent and global to the issue they are struggling with; questions that resolve the greatest amount of issues underlying them.

What types of materials do you typically use during a tutoring session?

A writing utensil, paper, and Internet access.

If a student has difficulty learning a skill or concept, what would you do?

This is a sign that the concept or skill is unfamiliar, and needs to be rephrased into metaphor. Metaphors are a connection between a source and target; everyday experience and abstract concepts.